Daisy
Patna : In an effort to give an impetus to the high speed trains, the second meeting of high level Joint Committee on Mumbai- Ahmedabad high speed rail project was held on May 16 in Tokyo, Japan. The Indian delegation was led by Dr Arvind Panagariya, Vice Chairman, NITI, Aayog. The other members of the team include A K Mital, Chairman, Railway Board, Shaktikanta Das, Secretary, Department of Economic Affairs, Jaishankar , Foreign Secretary and Ramesh Abhishek, Secretary , Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion.
The Japanese side was led by Hiroto Izumi, Special Adviser to the prime minister of Japan while other members from Japanese side include senior officials from Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT), Government of Japan, and senior officials from Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
The meeting of the Joint Committee was held to finalize the schedule of project, terms related to the appointment of General Consultant and procurement conditions. Since the loan negotiation and finalization of loan agreement will take time, the Government of India has requested for a proper schedule of project implementation . It has also requested for appointment of General Consultant before the finalization of loan agreement, sources said adding the appointment of General Consultant will enable start of preparatory activities like designing and preparation of tender documents.
Keeping in view the fact that ‘ Make in India and Transfer of Technology’ are key components of the project implementation, an industry interaction between Indian and Japanese companies is scheduled for May 17 , 2016. About 100 Japanese companies and 21 Indian companies will participate at the meeting. The industry interaction will enable Indian companies to explore business opportunities in collaboration with Japanese companies. Some of the Indian companies include BHEL, BEML, IRCON, Reliance Metro, Tata Infrastructure, JBM, Patil Infrastructure, IL&FS, Hindustan Construction Company, Texmaco Rail among others to part in the discussion , sources said .